6. Conclusion

• The choice of heat treatments in the automotive industry is essentially dictated by the logic of large production runs.

• It is mainly designed to solve fatigue, wear-friction and impact resistance problems, and to prepare materials for subsequent processing.

The solutions that are most widely developed are those that are most compatible with just-in-time production.

Increasingly, consideration is also being given to technologies that ensure good dimensional control and pose the fewest safety and effluent problems. From this point of view, processes based on vacuum technology should continue to develop.